Anxiety attacks and alcohol

just wondering if anyone else has ever found a link between these. i dunno if i even suffer from anxiety exactly, but the day after i have a bit to drink i feel really nervous and jittery and panicky- i think everyone is appalled at me being drunk-"Out of control" even though it was all fun, nothing bad happened and they were drunk too. I really panic thinking nobody respects me and the anxiousness lasts a good while

its doing my head in, this horrible sense of foreboding every time i have a night out! wtf?? does it sound like anxiety? :frown:

Reply 1

lskdgjsj

The link is quite simple. Alcohol, or rather ethanol, has to be metabolized by the body; when it is broken down in the liver you start to produce excess quantities of a substance called NADH, and this slows down the generation of glucose in the liver (gluconeogenesis). Now glucose is what powers your brain, and when it is deprived of its power source in any degree, you can experience anxiety and other mood disturbances, fatigue, poor concentration, and so on.

The anxiety before going out is a case of conditioning: every time you go out and drink you experience unpleasant aftereffects, so your body learns to associate drinking or going out with anxiety and other things, and thus you are moved to avoid it: anxiety.

To undo it you'll just have to recondition yourself: take steps to avoid getting this sort of hangover. Drink less, drink non-alcoholic drinks in between alcoholic drinks, eat well beforehand; some people take coke or something like that the next day, the sucrose partly makes up for the glyconeogenesis inhibition, but bear in mind that caffeine may make the symptoms worse. Be sure to eat well the next day to make up for lost nutrients.